Archive for March, 2011

Well my fellow Justinians, it is TIME TO DECIDE, on our village’s future.

Things have not been going as well as they could.

There is certainly too much infighting on the seated Justice Village Board.

The inserts that have been added to the door hangers, placed by the Peoples Voice Party, are inflammatory and certainly contain too many falsehoods to count. Ask yourself, why is it so common for politicians to blame the opponents for their own shortcomings? The PVP has been at the helm long enough for us voters to know just what they are about. A lot of splash, which usually means, short on substance. A large amount of our tax money has been wasted by the PVP.

What can we tell you that you probably haven’t already heard? How could three political parties find the will to part with the past and focus on the future?

We have seen the results that two years of political bickering have brought to the village of Justice. A place we all love. Elected trustees of a village are first and foremost servants and when they forget this, it’s time for them to move on. Shouldn’t a village board be the bedrock of a community? What about trustees working together with a mayor for the common good of the village? We just don’t have that right now, but this election can end this problem and bring attention back to where it needs to be. This election is historic, in that we can bring an order of pride and sensibility back to the residents by casting our vote. We must join together if we want to overcome the difficult times we live in. If the Coalition Party of three groups can understand this and come together then we believe the choice is obvious.

Four Peoples Voice trustees have left the village board since last election, four! Ask any mayor of any town if they have lost two trustees in a similar period, we have lost four. This is embarrassing and further drops our credibility when compared to other villages. If the PVP can’t keep their house in order, how will they handle an entire community?

Many years of hard work have given us fully reconstructed streets in the Roberts Park area of town with two and possibly three more to come. All of this was paid for with a $2.6 million state grant. This is what you get when a mayor works with his board and a good front office. What is the answer to this? Your current PVP trustees want to replace the administrator responsible for processing all of the complex paperwork on the project, with their campaign manager Jerry Carter. The current board is trying to dismantle a winning formula. Why? Mr. Carter does not have the experience we need to procure funds like this, but they tell us they can save money by paying him less. We believe this behavior is reckless and improper.

An historic monument was moved from where it sat for 40 years. This may not be news to you. What should have been a community-building event was turned into the personal ambition of just two individuals, Dan McGee and Kinga Bartoszek. There were no contests, no fund raising drives, no attempts made to consult with veterans groups, no pitching the idea to the town’s residents or consulting with the living seniors who worked to construct the original site, just the arrogance of conceit to push it through.

We now learn the new monument to Vets was placed on the same spot a new-lighted football/soccer field was to have been built! Because the Justice board trustees wouldn’t listen to anybody, including Lyons Township trustees administering the funding and their attorney, we just lost $316,000.00 of grant money to construct a ball field. The “Save The Timbers” Bond Referendum, approved by voters in 2004, is funding the Lyons Township Parks Program, our neighboring towns all got a piece of. This was a once in a lifetime opportunity.

Even though we will not get our share of the pie, we are Lyons Township residents and will still be paying the taxes for it. The good news is we can still go to any of the other Lyons Township villages and use their new facilities. Is that teamwork? No that’s your Peoples Voice Party.

The candidates of the Coalition Party of the Village of Justice are committed to progress, service and balance, and one more thing that the PVP lacks, respect for the community and its residents.

This is in response to the PVP’s misstatement from their flyer delivered to our residence on the 16 of March 2010 regarding political yard signs. It reads in part, that residents have informed them that they are being pressured to display the Coalition Party yard signs, while defacing and/or removing the PVP’s political signs. Nothing could be further from the truth.

If anyone from their following has, or as they say, witnessed the removal and/or defacement of any political yard signs, then, they are being less than truthful or it never happened. This is another absurd political tactic by the PVP.

If the “Peoples Voice Party believes in respecting the property of our residents” as they state on their flyer. Why then, would they be asking us, the residents to display their political propaganda inside our Homes; after all as the saying goes, aren’t our homes supposed to be our castles? Then, I believe that we should be spared their political drabble inside our homes. How disrespectful of the PVP.

Joe B. Egas

Concerned Village of Justice resident

4 Reasons Why I have Chose the Coalition Party of Justice

Rick Symonds– A dedicated public servant with experience spanning nearly 40 years through both the Village of Justice and our neighboring community of Bedford Park FireDepartments. Has an advanced degree in Fire Administration Management, Fire Prevention and Fire Science Technology. These are only some of his professional attributes.

Sue Small- Accomplished Operations Manager with over thirty years of experience working with Fortune 500 companies. Her current responsibilities as well as her experience as an independent business owner gives her the insight to understand business owners in The Village of Justice.

Ed Rusch Jr.– Ed has a long record of public service in the Village of Justice municipal government including service as a Trustee from 1989 to 1981, as Mayor from 1991 to 1997, and as Village Treasurer from 2007 to 2009. His vast experience will be an asset to our village government.

Richard Sparr- Rich has been a respected resident in the Village of Justice for over 30 years. He has served on the Village of Justice Fire department for 26 years rising to the rank of Lieutenant. He is certified as a fire and arson investigator and Hazardous Materials Technician. Richie has served the Vllage of Justice as Mayor and as Trustee.

From time to time we print emails that we recieve from residents allowing them to express their views via our website.

The following has been printed with permission.

I was at a board meeting last night for the 1st time since August. I had been told about the shenanigans that had been going on and thought that I would go see for myself. Shenanigans are not the word, I sat there in awe, I sat there thinking am I in a meeting with adults or am I in a meeting with Kindergartners? You have in one corner a resident who is asking a question about using the Lipinski center by the Park District without paying for the use, you have in the other corner a Trustee stating she has used her allotted time and then the other Trustee saying he wants to adjourn the meeting because he doesn’t like the questions being asked, and he wants to know if there is an ordinance saying people can’t ask questions.

Now the Attorney, who basically works for us, sits on his hands and doesn’t do a thing. The Mayor tries to reign in the residents and the Trustees by saying he runs the meeting they don’t and asks the residents to please keep it civil and the Trustee who wants to adjourn the meeting argues with him that he can motion to adjourn if he wants to, and he keeps this up, until again the Mayor states he is running the meeting and he will hear what the residents have to ask.

Another resident asks about the missing signs and she states she received a e-mail from a Trustee telling her if she allows them to come to her house, they will answer her questions about where the signs are. She states she is there, she would like her question answered and he states he can’t answer her questions but the other Trustee can, and the other Trustee says he is not answering the question, if she wants she can stay after and he will answer it then. They he proceeds to sit back in his chair and say he will not answer, and the Attorney says he doesn’t have to.

By this time, I am laughing and thinking, why did I come. There are so many important things that need to be discussed and taken care of by these people and they act like children. These are elected officials and they act like children, and if they were my children they would be in a time out. No respect for the people that elected you, chaos reigns at this board meeting, people talking over people, Trustees downgrading residents, what has become of this Village.

I don’t want Kindergartner’s running my Village, I want people who take responsibility for their actions, I want people who respond to the residents, I want people who don’t throw blame at people. I want six Trustees to work together to get this Village where it belongs and right now that is not happening. They are digging a pit, and very big pit, and they are throwing us in it and I don’t want to go.

Please get out there and vote people, and it you haven’t been to a board meeting, the last one with these current Trustees, I hope, is on the 29th of March, come on in and see who you voted for, and the latest edition of the Village of Justice’s imitation of the Charlie Sheen Fiasco.

For the second board meeting in a row, Trustees from the People’s Voice Party made an attempt to adjourn the meeting while a resident had a question on the floor, only this time, it proved unsuccessful as the resident came prepared with a copy of Robert’s Rules of Order. That didn’t seem to halt Trustee Bartoszek who made a further attempt to end the “Voices from the Floor” portion of the meeting; she came armed with a portion of the Village Code and was attempting to use it against the resident, but only succeeded in getting across that there is a time limit per question. As it seems to be the case lately, more residents are coming out and asking tough questions which they seem to not want to answer, at least not when they’re recorded in the minutes or Trustee McGee’s husband is filming.

Further to that point another resident approached the board bringing forth a copy of an email sent to her from Trustee Koszlowski, offering for he and Trustee DePaola to stop over at her house to explain further the situation on the village signs. However, she was wondering why this couldn’t of been done at the last board meeting when she asked for an explanation in front of the entire board and audience? Looking like a deer caught in the headlights, Koslowski and DePaola bounced the situation back and forth between each other, stammering that they couldn’t answer the question within the proper time frame of a village board meeting. Looks like the transparency that the People’s Voice Party promises really delivers! After outcry from the packed house Trustee DePaola attempted to answer the questions after the meeting, and after his cigarette break, but the answers he gave just didn’t seem to satisfy anyone.

In the category of most tasteless stands Trustee Bartoszek, who is over administration and finance. When pressed by a resident why an outside IT company was hired at a high cost per hour, when an in house IT person could have done the work cheaper, she stated that the money used to pay for that work was donated by the Trustees salaries, and they had the right to spend it in any way they saw fit. Apparently being financially responsible doesn’t extend over into that arena either. In a move of poor taste and lack of professional courtesy, she then went on to publically criticize the former employee’s performance as he sat there in the audience. Nothing like an evening full of community building and transparency brought to you, courtesy of the People’s Voice Party.

We want to hear your opinions on what you think of recent events happening at board meetings and through the village.

Wednesday night, at the committee meeting, “Fill” D. once again made a spectacle of himself when he presented the board with what has become this years PVP marketing tool:THE BIG CHECK.Of course, the cameras were rolling and I’m sure you will see the pictures in the next piece of campaign literature.Oh, the patriotism these dedicated officials have…

Problem…There’s actually a couple of them.You see, “The Big Check´ was written on the backside of an orange Village Voice campaign sign from a couple of elections ago.We are curious how Phil got his hands on that sign.Maybe he had removed the sign to make repairs and was going to return the sign?Maybe he likes reading Mike Murray’s name when it’s upside down?

But really, the biggest problems are the reasons the big check was paid back in the first place.Could it be he was caught not giving it back?Seems to me…he never made mention they were going to create an IOU when he voted to volunteer his trustees pay.(Different story there!)He lost his job at the Water Commission.Was it pride; the public servant couldn’t make ends meet? He stated he would be “a role model” for Public Service.Oh please.

Problem two…the Peoples Voice Party is running for election.(That’s were it’s at).We know they are not doing it for political reasons…they said so.Will they be selling us a bridge now?I know this was political and we all know an election gimmick when we see one.You can read about it in their campaign literature.Signing off now…

There are many wonderful souls that make up the Village Voice. All of us are deeply saddened by the passing of our beloved Adrian Borst. Adrian fell asleep in the lord on Thursday. There will be a wake for Adrian on Sunday at Damar-Kaminski funeral home, 7861 South 88th ave Justice, the hours are 3-9:00pm. Mass will be Monday at Saint Fabians Church, 8300 Thomas ave Bridgeview, at 11:15am.

Adrian and his wife Pat have lived in Justice for over fifty years where they raised a family and are well known throughout the community. Many of us first met him as a Justice trustee. At a time when no one would listen, Adrian broke with his own political party to speak for the residents on Maplewood, 73rd Place and 86th Avenue. Adrian was an original founder of the Village Voice, through which his advice and strength is the backbone of our group. We will miss him dearly.

All is well my fellow Justinian’s. In my cycling adventures I have noticed the Robins and the Cardinals are about. Soon we will see lovely shades of green and pastels. Some of the green will be the Lawn Signs of the”Coalition Party of Justice”, yes fellow voters the CPOJ. It looks to me, that because of the frustration with the antics of the present seated Village Board, the COALITION PARTY was born. I’m sure the C P will talk about the plans that they have for our proud and broke village. The greatest improvement can be is that they WILL NOT treat people of Justice the way the “People’s Voice Party” has been conducting business. It is incredible as to what they have said and have done. The lack of sophistication by the PVP has become obvious. It is all about them and certainly not our village.

The disdain they have for our village is self evident.

It shows in many ways because of their antics and spell check I could go on forever.

Truth is we don’t want them around, certainly not on our Village Board.

Time to punch DELETE. That would be done by voting for the good guys.

The Coalition Party of Justice, you will see the names on the green lawn signs. Because of circumstances, there is not enough balance on the present village board.

Your vote for the good guys will correct that mistake.

Come to the Corned Beef and Cabbage Dinner March 12th at Szarotka’s; ask questions, you will find that the good guys are very smart. They know stuff! They can do more!

The CPOJ needs your input, as apposed to the opposition, they will listen.

Last Monday night, at the village board meeting, Trustees Mary McGee, Phil DePaola, and John Koslowski felt the pressure of several unhappy residents. Numerous questions and comments criticizing them for mishandling various issues left all three with frustrated faces.

Being criticized, in an open setting, with over 80 people in attendance was more than the three trustees could endure. Question after question described their continued unprofessional and incompetent performance over the last several months. Unlike the common pats on the back they continue to give each other, the residents bombarded Trustees McGee, Depaola and Koslowski with precise and uncomplimentary remarks.

As the pressure mounted their frustration continued to unfold. At one point in the meeting Trustee Kolsowski was heard to say, “I don’t need this” and began to storm out of the room. In an attempt to save his companion and his party from complete embarrassment Trustee DePaola made a motion to end the meeting and was second by his fellow trustee McGee.

When the vote was taken Only Trustee Rusch voted no in hopes of having the meeting continue until “all” the residents had an opportunity to speak. Unfortunately the meeting was terminated and the three trustees left the hall quickly with disappointment on their faces and their tail tucked between their legs.

Good morning my fellow Justinian’s, have you noticed all of those lost looking people wandering around Justice. Not knowing where they were!
That is because somebody stole our Justice signs, yes folks our signs. “The Great Sign Caper” it would be funny but they cost 10 thousand bucks.
The unholy four on our village board, McGee, Bartosak, DePaolo and Koslowski claimed innocence, they knew nuttin. When asked why so much money was spent on cutting the grass (we got clipped) they knew nuttin.
When asked why, not all seniors were invited to the Senior Dinner at the Lipinski Center and who paid for the function. You guessed it,
they knew nuttin. The four Nuttins on the Village Board get very angry when asked about how and the process they use to spend the villages tax money. It is looking kinda slimey, the nuttins are a slippery bunch.
It is our money,,,,,,,, maybe they should slip slide away.